We all know and fell in love with Kyla Pratt from her roles as Penny Proud in The Proud Family and Breanna Barnes in One on One and while she appears to not have aged a day, the beloved actress is an adult and has since expanded her career beyond her iconic childhood characters.
At 35, Kyla has gone on to star in the TV One film The Secret She Kept, the Christmas film Let’s Meet Again on Christmas Eve and more recently she stars in the Fox sitcom Call Me Kat and the reboot of The Proud Family on Disney +. And while her claim to fame blazed the trail for her career today, the mom of two admitted that she was once ‘triggered’ by only being known as a childhood actress.
In an interview with Jemele Hill for her podcast Unbothered with Jemele Hill, Kyla explained why that very thing would set her off. “I think it was something that I was internalizing; I know that people would say things that they didn’t realize was triggering,” she said. “The worst thing was always, ‘Oh my gosh; you used to be an actress. What are you doing now?’ and I’m like, ‘I just did a TV show, y’all didn’t see it? You wanna check it out?’”
Actress @KylaPratt opens up about her transition from child star to adult actor and the important life lessons she's learned along the way.
— Jemele Hill Is Unbothered (@JHillUnbothered) May 23, 2022
Full episode: https://t.co/r7Hidav2Hppic.twitter.com/rrLeM0du7p
While it was triggering for the L.A. native at first, she realized that it wasn’t the fans’ fault and decided to look inward to figure out why it caused such an emotional response.
“When you’re in your feelings about certain things and certain comments come your way—you know—but I’m one of those people, I try to recognize why I’m being triggered or what it is that someone’s doing that’s making me feel some type of way in order for me to work on it,” she said.
“So I knew that it wasn’t coming from a malicious place from them, so I knew it was something that I had to work on. I was just in an overthinking mindset and I’m glad that that time in my life is over.”
Kyla also talked about her time on Insecure. TheProud Family: Louder and Prouder actress appeared on season four episode six of the popular HBO series starring Issa Rae. Her character Dina ended up scamming Issa’s character after meeting at a paint and sip.
Kyla revealed that she auditioned for another role on the show and after not getting it, Issa reached out to her because she still wanted her a part of the project. “If I would have been all in my ‘I’m not going to audition, uh uh I’m not doing that.’ I would have never gotten the opportunity that came to me,” she said.
Kyla Pratt on Auditioning for Insecure and Awkward Encounter with Cast Member
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Featured image by Prince Williams/Wireimage